The Write Path
This is the podcast for authors to tell their tales. We don't just talk about our books, our work, our craft... We also talk about our journey, our mission and our stories. This is for the authors who understand that Chat GPT doesn't have a heart, or a soul. This is for the authors that believe YOUR story matters, the one you've lived, and the one you've told. Here, we all know that each page is a step forward. Welcome. This is the way...
The Write Path
The Write Path #50 - "Stained Glass Mustang," with Author Tim Bryant!!!
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From "The Stained Glass Mustang" by Tim Bryant...
"What if your shot at redemption came painted across the hood of a car?John Williams had it all-until one drunk drive left his career and reputation in ruins. Now the once-celebrated Charleston adman is down to a single client: a sleazy hustler who thrives on scandal. Just when John thinks he's hit bottom, he inherits a vintage sports car covered in vivid, hand-painted scenes from the life of Christ. To his client, it's the perfect PR stunt. To a fiery single mother with a strong south-of-the-border accent and unshakable faith, using the car this way is a sin. Torn between exploitation and reverence, John must navigate temptation, truth, and his own battered conscience to discover whether salvation is something he can sell-or something he has to earn." From herding cows in his Jaguar to sunning on his beach house on stilts, this author has QUITE a STORY! Listen now.
Website: https://timbryantsarmadilloisland.com/
Book Link: https://www.amazon.com/Stained-Glass-Mustang-Tim-Bryant/dp/1963115724
Welcome to the Write Path Podcast, where being an author, an actual author, still matters. This isn't the place for the Chat GPT experts or the AI buffs to churn out soulless content with no heart. This is the place where authors share their journeys, explore their creativity, examine the "Why?" behind it all and come together to celebrate each other. This is the podcast for authors, about authors, and by an author, where the truth still counts and words still have power. Join Us! You have a story to tell!
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This is the place where authors know that every page... is a step forward. Let's move forward together, let's move forward today. Listen now.
This meeting is being recorded.
SPEAKER_00All right. Hello, folks, and uh welcome back to uh the Right Path Podcast, where the truth still matters and words still have power. This is the place for authors who know that every page is a step forward towards finding your right path. And in that vein, this is the podcast that is for authors, it is about authors, and it's done by an author. Uh, folks, this is where we share our journeys, we explore our creativity, and we examine the why behind it all. Our guest today is here to do just that. Uh, I'm excited to have this gentleman on here. Um, he is uh an accomplished author of several books. Uh, most recently The Stained Glass Mustang, which we're gonna hear all about today, including his story. Please welcome the show Tim Bryant. Tim, how are you doing, brother?
SPEAKER_02Hey, I'm doing great. Thank you for having me on.
SPEAKER_00All right. I'm glad you're here. Um, I'll tell you what, uh, I've had a chance to look into the book a little bit and you know, kind of read your bio. You have one heck of a story. Um I'm gonna I'm gonna throw it to you a little and say, hey, why don't we start with just tell everybody a little bit about who is Tim? You know, what are you about?
SPEAKER_02I am the end result of a lot of hard knocks, I think. Um I um actually I used to work in arts administration, and then I went into uh ad agency work and whatnot, and and I've I've lived a lot of different places. I'm in South Carolina now. I've always kind of thought of myself as a uh South Carolinian, having uh done my grade school years here and and traveling around. I just always felt drawn to come back to the South, and so I did, and I am now uh living out in the country, which is a little bit different for me, being mainly a city boy. For instance, when the the power goes out, you don't have water. I don't know if anyone else has experienced that, but but um but I started writing uh when I was uh when I was a kid, just because we were in kind of a I was in a big household and and um it was just a nice escape from the chaos of of uh a big family. You know, I could kind of crawl off to my own little space and think about things. It gave me a sense of freedom, and uh and it kind of did the same thing that sailing did for me. I started that at about the same age. And so um after I didn't I never really took writing that seriously though. Um my writings were always just sort of what I uh describe as like doodling with words and you know, kind of cartooning or whatever. Um, even even in my young adult life, as I began writing in the early mornings before I went into work, it was mainly uh an exercise to make sure I was awake and ready to face my bosses or my clients or whatever might come my way. And um and it kind of went on like that. I made it a practice to set aside the first hour when I could every day just to write something over a cup of coffee and wake up, and all that stuff was tossed into uh boxes from the liquor store and shoved into a closet. It wasn't really until uh I was uh it was about 2009 or so. I just moved into this house out here, and this is an actual beach house built up on stilts 11 feet off the ground in a cow pasture. It's it's kind of like if you ever heard of Christo, you know, the environmental artist, it's kind of like that in my own strange way. And uh so I moved out to the country and it was it was just totally wrong for me. There was it was just the the the initial getting used to being out here. Um, you know, I didn't share any interest with with other people, you know, I wasn't a big uh bass fisherman or deer hunter or whatever. Um my wife later explained to me that people out here didn't really have time, the luxury of time, to write. They were too busy trying to survive. And so I, you know, I just never really found that many connections. And so, and at about the same time I'd sold my my big sailboat, and uh, and I missed the water. And so I was down in the little pond, it's about a 40-acre pond behind our house through the woods, and I was floating around on a some on a swim noodle, and I kept seeing these little squiggly things out of the corner of my eyes. Well, they were water moccasins, I found out later. And so that was like that was another shock, and that led me to buying a $200 rubber kitty pool from big lots, you know, the ones that look like the blue mushroom.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and so oh my wife, she freaked. But I put it out in the yard and I climbed into that thing and practically stayed a whole summer in it. I mean, I floated around. I had actually someone's got a picture of me floating around in that thing in a beach lounger with a big blue cup balanced on my forehead, and I am just out. Um, I'm gonna say I had just taken a nap, but let's go with that. Yeah, let's go with that. And so um that began. Um, just a whole lot of things happened there, a series of losses during the time that I was getting used to my new surroundings and a new culture, which now I love. Um that led to me every day writing what was sort of like a blog. It was mainly for my own my own fun and my own kind of trying to explore where I was at that moment in life. You know, what is all this stuff that all I that I'm dealing with and struggling with? And um so I set that aside for a while, and then I had the big wreck, a major wreck that is that resulted in an acetabular fracture, which was basically my femur being shoved through my hip socket to enough to come out the back. The uh surgeon said it was like a finger going through a saltine cracker, and ended up in a wheelchair for a while and had nothing to do but write. And so I went back to that those um series of blogs and kind of stripped out you know the some pieces of it and put it together into a book called Blue Rubber Pool, and it's all about that summer in that pool. Now, um it was published, but as it was being published, the uh publisher was losing her eyesight. It's just like just one more, you know, one more landmark in the path of my life. What in the world, man? Okay. I didn't know what I was doing, and and so the book was just chock full of typos and just screw-ups and stuff. And so I I've I've I took it back and I've got it. It's still for sale. If everybody wants to see what a really rough, you know, just crazy, insane writing of a guy going through what I call the mother of all midlife meltdowns. That's the Blue Rubber Pool book. But um, about that time, because I was stuck in a chair and I was in the house and I was reaching out to people over the internet, I met some other writers. And um they encouraged me to keep going. And what else could I do? So while I was going through that solitary phase of my recovery, you know, getting up, being able to walk again, and it was a while. Um, you know, out of a out of a wheelchair into a walker. I still use a cane sometimes. But anyway, everybody encouraged me to keep going, and I had a story in mind. And so um, that was my second novel, and it was called The Bird in Your Heart, a Carolina Sea Island story. And it's uh another story of midlife confusion. It's about a a guy who um he's married to the the boss's daughter. He divorces her, loses his job, and moves back to a little island off the um uh off the coast of South Carolina, right near Charleston, and it's called Edisto. And um, and it's about he he's he goes back to to the house where he grew up, the old family house, been there for generations. His plan is to buy a sailboat, take off. But his mother is going blind, and I took that from my publisher. Yeah, there's a connection and everything in this. Um, but anyway, um she's going blind, and their big old house needs these extensive repairs, and so he's torn between taking off or doing what he needs to do for the family. He's an only child, and you know, when he goes into that house, he he sees all the portraits of his ancestors frowning at him, you know, like you better do the right thing. So it's a story of that, and it's set on a little island which has um island life is very different, you know, from from mainland life. In the low country of South Carolina, it's very unique culturally. There's just a lot of history and flavors and natural beauty down there, it's just incredible. And so I was able to pull all those together into that book, and um and so that just led to then the next one, the stained glass Mustang, which just came out a few weeks ago through um unsolicited press. And that's another story of the same thing. Only in this in this story, he is a uh advertising executive who drove drunk, um, killed a little girl, lost everything, his family, his job, his friends, you know, his reputation. And so he's starting over living on a sailboat uh on the Cooper River, um, having lived, having kept the sailboat previously on the Ashley. And if you know Charleston, Ashley's where you want to be. On the Cooper, he's next to a shipyard. So it's just it's just another fun story. Um, it's based on the the what I think really makes that one unique is that um he has one client. The client has him over a barrel, and um and and the guy is stuck, he's depending on this guy, he's an internet scammer, um, but he needs that guy to survive, to pay a slip fee, to you know, uh have a little have a can of sardines or whatever on the boat. And then he inherits this car. It's a vintage uh Mustang convertible, and when he goes to pick it up, um it is covered bumper to bumper in scenes from the life of Christ. Uh, all these famous um paintings. And so he brings it back to uh the Charleston area and rolls up to see his boss, is his only client. And his client thinks, You are a genius, you're gonna whitewash my reputation. And so the guy just kind of like says, I'm gonna have to go with this. And so he is, he's he's using this car. He takes the car out to these hokey little um country racetracks and just stands by it and hands out refrigerator magnets and while the client sells his junk out of the flea market or out of the back of the truck or whatever. And um, and then he meets a uh a woman, uh, she's a Hispanic woman, um, uh very vivacious, single mom, who's also a jewelry artist, and she looks at the car and she says, Doing what you're doing is a sin against God. And he's starting to have an attraction to her, and so now he's in this wedge between the client and the girl, and and it it's just kind of a fun story. Um, how the pe how different people from all different walks of life react to what's on that car. Um, in that sense, it has a little bit of uh maybe magical realism, you know, to it, is that the car maybe does have some special mojo. Um little kids just can't they can't stay away from it, you know, because their little minds are just so pure, you know. Um other people look at it and they argue over, you know, what years it is, is it two-cylinder or four-cylinder, you know, or whatever. Um and so that's that's the stained glass Mustang. That's that's where I am right now, and I have another one in the works, but um that's that's my world as a writer. It's very solitary out here. Um country life. I sometimes open the door and there's deer standing everywhere out there, or there's turkeys, and uh it's pretty laid back.
SPEAKER_00Sounds like you've embraced the the the country life, I mean, fully after sort of being like, I don't know about this. Uh if you come around.
SPEAKER_02I fought it, I fought it hand in fist. I really I hated it. But um, but I really have now. I don't think I could go back. I mean, I I enjoy going back to cities. I mean, what I used to live in places where you just step out your front door, you know, a whole bunch of old brownstones and walk a block and then around the corner and there's a great bar, or you know, the other way is another place you like, or whatever, a big park or something. I'm I'm very much used to that, or was. Um, but I just now it is so quiet out here, and it's just so it's just so peaceful. Like when I see the the breezes blowing through the the pasture out. I'm up on the third floor of my beach house, and this is my writing space. There's a there's like a little balcony out here, like two or three people could stand on it, and I call that the crow's nest. But I'll open that up sometime, and the yard will just be loaded with deer or with turkeys, or sometimes when the breeze is blowing just right, the grass is in that pasture that it looks just like the sea. It's crazy. And when you hear the wind approaching you from miles away, I mean literally miles away, and it's approaching you through the treetops and stuff, it sounds like the sea. And so kind of becoming tuned into that, it relaxed me. It kind of brought me brought me into it. I at one point I had an old uh jaguar, nothing, it was like a sedan, it wasn't anything special, but it was a smooth ride and it was cool, you know. Um, but the cows got out, and I've got a picture of me herding cows in that jaguar going through the field trying to get his cows, you know, the jeep, the farm jeep wouldn't start, so I'm out there bouncing around in this old. I mean, I've really I've jumped, I've left into the whole the whole deal out here. It's just so much fun.
SPEAKER_00So fully embraced as an understatement if you're herding cows in in a you know.
SPEAKER_02I'm talked about now. Crazy guy.
SPEAKER_00That's awesome. I love the crow's nest thing too. I mean, that's gotta just be absolutely gorgeous.
SPEAKER_02It's really nice, and it at night you just stand out there and and you can hear the uh the geese down in the the pond, you know, they they squabble and get into these big fights, and then when the train goes through a few miles from here, the coyotes that live down there just go insane. So all the city sounds are now these sounds, and kind of now that I know what they are and I've gotten used to it, you know, I'm I'm I'm good. When it when I would be out on my sailboat sometimes, especially when I when I um would sit down and try to to write on the sailboat out in the water, and I'd hear these weird squeaks and these weird groans and these weird, you know, it's just such a distraction. And then I got you know, I got used to it. The total quiet was a problem at first, and then all these weird noises, and then I got, you know, once you once you kind of take all those in and acclimate yourself to them, and now it's a great place for writing. I'm I'm not writing my I'm not working on my my last or fourth novel right now because I'm working on you know getting um the stained glass Mustang up on its legs, but um, but I I'm waiting until fall and winter. That's my usual time for writing here because I am inside a lot. In the summers, I I I like to read. I go down, I have a hot tub for my injury, and I go out and get in a hot tub with a book, and I've got a hammock on the second floor on a screen porch. I sit out there, and you know, summer and spring and summer are my reading times, fall and winter are my writing times.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Wow. Um I mean you unpacked a lot, and I love that. So I'm I'm I'm glad we're having this conversation. The um the the faith aspect of the book, when you're sitting there talking about, you know, the Christ scenes, you know, in the car and whatnot. Yeah, is it a coincidence that that happens after this huge accident?
SPEAKER_02Well, uh, I have been questioning, I I I have been wondering about faith all my life. Yeah. And when I was a little kid, I was probably like a lot of young guys my age that might have been a little bit rambunctious or whatever, and their their dad had to like you know box them in the ears or whatever to get them to go to church. And something about that just didn't seem right. And and so I truly I resisted it. And uh do you remember the scene from Forrest Gump where he's up in the mast? Um, Lieutenant Dan is up in the mast during the storm and he's waving his fist at God. Well, when I was about 21, I was up in a construction cane at night during a lightning storm. And I was wave waving my fist at God. And and I was mad at God for a very long time, and and then I suddenly became a single dad for a little while, and that sort of humbled me. Uh, and then I met this incredible woman who became their mother, and sh her middle name is Hope, and she totally changed me. Uh she she at least got me to begin seeing things around me, um, feeling things maybe that I hadn't felt. And some of it was very, I don't know, you might think it kind of cold when you think about faith or or Christianity, but the first things that really got me to hold on was um are you familiar with the Fibonacci sequence or the Fibonacci math?
SPEAKER_01Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02The idea that these this mathematical sequence repeats itself so many places. And I'm thinking that just I don't know, can that really be random? I don't know. And then I began thinking that can't be random. And then I began, I began going to church, but but it was a small country church, and that didn't go well because I mean I was reading, well, I forget what they're called, but you know, the things where the whole congregation reads together from the book, hymnal book, I think. Um I I didn't have my readers with me, and and um it said goats. I read gnats. I said instead of the whatever they were doing with the goats, they were doing it with gnats, g-n-a-t-s. It was like, and nobody looked at me or anything. And then another thing that happened was our preacher was a he was a former logging truck driver who got the calling, very nice guy. But he gave a sermon one time on be careful what you wish for, but it was about the slaves, and that just hit me wrong. Like he was kind of saying, Oh, maybe they wouldn't have wished for freedom if they knew what it was like out there. And I was like, Are you insane? And so that kind of pushed Yeah, yeah. So that pushed me back out a little bit, but then you know, after the after the wreck, you know, I did have so much time to to start thinking about things, and I started, you know, not reading the Bible, but reading sort of like the Bible for dummies, you know, kind of stuff. Yeah, and and and and listening to some, you know, um some TV ministers, and um, and then uh I had this little rescue pup who had to be outside every morning at five o'clock. And so every morning at five o'clock while I'm walking this dog, you know, big property out here, um I was walking him along, and I would I would always be drawn to looking up into the heavens. And then I began drawn, especially as I was had finished the the um the uh burden your heart book and was thinking about the stained glass Mustang story. I I actually started talking to God. This is gonna sound weird. I I mean, I don't have any tinfoil.
SPEAKER_00Um nothing's gonna sound weird on this podcast.
SPEAKER_02But I truly did. I I you know one thing my wife always has said is that to get closer to God, you have to talk to God, and more importantly, you have to listen. And so my walks in the morning became you know questions first, like you know, beginning with why am I out here, you know, kind of thing. Is this really where I'm meant to be forever? And you know, and then I started feeling more peaceful about it and stuff like that. Well, then I started asking about the stained glass Mustang story because I had the concept, but you know, it's it's kind of weird. I didn't know how um some Christians might react to it. Um there's some things in the in the story that um very conservative Christians might not like. I don't want to say what that is yet, but it has to do with yeah. So anyway, um, and and so I I just really listened on it. And every day, I you know, uh not every day would I ask, but you know, it I'd ask about a lot of things in those different walks, but then about every every month or so many weeks, I'd go, Are you really sure about this? And I it wasn't like I got a a voice said, Tim, do it. It wasn't like that at all, but it was just this sense of peace or something about trying to write it. And I I enjoyed writing it. It was a lot of fun to write, um, even though it is kind of a dark story at times. And um, and I'm glad it's I'm glad it's done, and I'm now I'm kind of waiting for what is the reaction gonna be. I mean, some news releases have gone out to some uh Christian news writers and some um Christian um podcasts and things, and and so the books are going out to those people, and I don't know what the reaction is gonna be. I I have I have had a minister in North Carolina actually thank me for writing it, and so that was kind of like we could send the rest of those news releases out. You know, and so I I'm still kind of I'm I really am waiting for the other foot to drop. It's gotten very good reviews so far on Goodreads, and and you know, those are all um uh advanced reader copy reviews. And now that the book is up, it's they're starting to come in on Amazon and other places. It's available all over the place. I mean Barnes and Noble and Walmart online.
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_02Um, and we're trying to get them into the the stores. I'm I'm right now focusing on getting it into the stores down in the down in the coast because it's set there. But but yeah, that's my the faith, it it really was a it really was a journey of faith for me. Now, I still like just yesterday, I was out, I I can ride a bike now. I I have to it has to be an e-bike because I have to have that power assist for my injury or whatever, but I was just out pedaling around in the country side out here trying to not get creamed by a logging truck. And um, and I was I was saying, God, I were you were telling me to do this, right? I mean, you what or or did I just hear that, or did I just want to hear that? And I and so I made it true. So I don't know. I don't know, Roy. It's it's I don't know what's right.
SPEAKER_00I mean, I I think I asked the right question, but I'm really I'm really glad that I did. Um, you know, writing so often can just be uh therapeutic, it can be our own personal journey.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um from the beginning of writing this book to the end of writing this book to where you are today, um, has that impacted your feeling about this, your understanding of it, maybe how you feel about you know your faith and your connection and that type of thing.
SPEAKER_02Well, it it because the way that different people do react to that car and and and its its paintings, and due to the character, the main character protagonist being caught in the middle between basically good and bad, you know, you you know, the his his evil client wants him to exploit this car for you know selfish and actually evil purposes. And and this guy he knows better. He knows better than that. And and and yet, and the other thing too, just as a backstory, he he always really wanted to be a painter, and his dad kind of drove him into it's kind of like don't quit your day job kind of thing. His dad kind of said get a day job first, and that's how he ended up. He was actually an advertising executive, and he ended up not being a graphic designer, but a but an account supervisor and a very good one at bringing in new businesses and you know, new clients, and that sort of thing. Um, and so it was kind of neat feeling him go from sort of a cynical, kind of full of himself, you know, egotistical guy in the beginning, to being somebody completely different in the end. And what got him there was this car, not just its impact on him sort of being dependent on it, you know, for his survival, but you know, and being caught in the middle between these two forces, but also in him seeing how other people, you know, responded to it. And and uh there's there's just a lot of other sort of subplots and things that that weigh in on what this car means and um a lot of very complex kind of things related to his relationship with his father, who who he was estranged from, and that's what from whom he got the car, and you know, just a whole bunch of stuff. So it really did. Um it's kind of now that it's written though, um when I go out uh with the dog in the morning, I like I said, I'm not I'm not sure that I'm confident that I wrote it, but I feel glad that I wrote it because for me, the process of it, I mean, I had the general kernel of the idea and I had the setting. And beyond that, I wasn't really sure what was going to happen. And I'm not one of those writers who plots out, you know, a book very far. I mean, I'll have a general idea, I try and get it up on its legs as fast as I can, you know, in that first chapter or whatever. And and then if I feel like I need to, I might sit down and and come up with a few main, you know, kind of benchmarks for it. Kind of like writing a screenplay, you know, where you have the turning point and all that stuff. Um, I'll do that. And so um I don't know, I I I felt like I I felt like I was growing as I wrote it. And and other people who have read it said it really gave them a sense of joy. Um, a recent reviewer um said that it describes love in all its various forms of love, including self-love. And that's self-love. You gotta have some self-love, you know, to to exist in in this world as far as to be spiritually where you want to be, to I think to have a relationship with Christ. I mean, Christ will build that for you, but you've got to have a, I think, a certain uh sort of a certain balance or stability in your in your spiritual self to even open your mind and and your heart to to Christ and and the influence of that.
SPEAKER_00Wow, that that's powerful stuff. That's a great review. Yeah, that is, it was, yeah, yeah, it was. I'll take that into the week.
SPEAKER_02You said it should be a movie, and I'm like, bring it on.
SPEAKER_00Time to call Netflix, man. Here we go. All right.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I'm counting you for that, Rory.
SPEAKER_00Oh my gosh. No, it's all right. I love it. I really do. Um, you mentioned process, you know, and I mean, um with the with the move, of course, from you know where you were out to the country and getting acclimated and all that, then there's uh, you know, the water moccasins in the water, then there's the gigantic injury and that life-altering thing. Um, how has your process evolved, you know, from the first book to where you are now through necessity and preference both?
SPEAKER_02Well, um, the writing process, first of all, in in my earlier days before I started writing novels, um I you know, I would write like little essays or little poems or you know, whatever. Um and I would just jot them down, and then I may, if I had time left, go back and try and perfect them. And I carried that process over to writing the um the blogs that came out of the blue rubber pool and then went into the blue rubber pool of the book. Um I when I wrote those, I would say, I'm gonna write for at least a good hour and see how many words. I mean, I'm not gonna worry about word count, I'm just gonna write. And and a lot of it was just kind of unloading things about you know being that stage of my life, I guess you could say. And um, but I really didn't worry about going back and trying to polish anything. I just left it like it was. And then when the time came to pull them together, I I went through and I did clean them up, you know, and and and string them together. But I but that first book taught me a lot about continuity, about um about what I did, about what not to do, in trying to bring in, you know, like too many background characters, too many background. I mean, that book it flips everywhere. It it's set in a blue rubber pool in the country, but it goes into flashbacks, it goes into real things that might really be happening, as if you might have gotten out of the pool, it goes into things that might be dreams, I mean, it bounces all over and it's way too much. I mean, I tell people, you know, don't read that book unless you don't mind getting lost, because you will you will get lost in that book. It's very abstract. I mean, one guy said, you know, Tim, if we put the right 20 people together, they'd know where that whole book came from. And I'm like, I hope we never get those 20 people together. I don't want anybody to know where it came from. Um, but then the process, as I when I put that together into a novel and said, you know what, I think I could write a novel, then it becomes, well, how do you write a novel? And out here, there's no writing groups out here, and even if there were at that moment in time, I couldn't get to them. I mean, I couldn't, I was stuck at the house, you know, in a wheelchair or on a walk or whatever. And so I I did kind of, you know, try to self study you know, try and teach myself a little bit, just I I like to read novels, and that helped. And I went back to, you know, some of the novels that I that I used to like when I was young and kind of thought about, you know, what did I like about those novels? And then as far as the process goes, I really would start with just the kernel of an idea. I mean, you know, for the stained glass Mustang, you know, um, a guy who's who's um over the barrel, you know, at the hitting the bottom, and he's over the barrel by a bad guy, inherits a car that's covered bumper to bumper with scenes from the life of Christ. I mean, that was it. And um, it's kind of like they said that Star Trek, the the pitch, the one-sentence pitch for Star Trek was wagon train in space. You ever hear that?
SPEAKER_00I have not heard the, and I'm a Trekie. I haven't heard that before. Oh my gosh. That's really accurate.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it was in a it's one of the long time ago, I I read a book about um screenwriting, and that helped me too. Um, because uh, as I mentioned before, you know, screenwriting has these certain has a certain format to it where certain things need to happen by. And um, you know, like there's there's the opening and then there's the turning point, and then there's the resolution towards the end, and you know, whatever. And so the pacing of it has to, I mean, that was my basic framework for pacing was if I was going to write this as a screenplay, what would be the basic, you know, turning points and resolution point, what how far into it do these different things need to happen? And that helped. Um, so that got me through sort of the structure of getting a getting a book, getting a story started, and developing characters and bringing in, I I because I am a southern-spirited writer, maybe, um, I love the South as for the sense of place that it gives me. Um it southern Southern stories tend to really kind of be rooted in and reflect their surroundings, um, the natural beauty, the culture, the the quirks of the people, you know. Um and so I knew that I wanted to incorporate those in. And and so that was sort of my next step. I mean, the next novel, the the bird on your heart book, kind of I think it it did well. I was happy with how that one worked out, and other people, you know, have been too. Um, but I made a lot of mistakes, you know. I mean, there's there's then then you you get into the grammar and the you know, don't use the same word over and over too many times, you know, like just. Well, it's just one mile down the road, you know, these kind of waste words, you know, um, things like that, that in the writing process, um, if you go through and and and go through with I like I I keep a little list of what those words are. And um, you know, and so now I I go through and I just knock them out, you know, as as I go. But it still is sort of a fly by the seat of your pants um process. I mean, when I get when I get through the first chapter or maybe the third chapter, and I'm starting to bring in other characters, I might write maybe, I don't know, a bullet point about each character. Where I know other writers, they write pages and pages, you know, a lot of Freudian stuff. How do you get along with his mother and you know, this weird stuff? Um, and they and they do the same thing with with writing. Like I know this one person who I met her before the wreck, and she was writing a book, and she still hasn't finished it, but it's like 500 pages of notes. It's like, what are you doing? You're killing yourself, you know. Enjoy the process of you know, the creative process of writing, yeah, and and let that, you know, put some crayons on the table and see what happens, you know. Um, you know, and and I remember um there's a saying, I I think it's from the Middle East somewhere, maybe India, I don't know, um, that goes um the easiest way to sculpt an elephant, like to create a sculpture of an elephant, is to chip away anything that doesn't look like an elephant. And it's kind of like, duh, but whoa. Okay, you know, and that's part of it too. I mean, a lot of you know, you have to self-check yourself, you know, you have to self-check as you go through your work and go, does that really bring anything to it? Um, you know, is that really necessary? And I'm I think I'm I've gotten a lot better in in the second and the third um on that. And and then the fourth one I'm working on, it's it's totally for I I think it's gonna be my last because I really I need to get out of the I need to get outside more. I can't sit here the rest of my life, but but it's totally for me. It's all about experimental things like nested fiction, you know, a story within a story, a book within a book. Um, I want to try that just to see if I can pull it off. You know, a lot of people, you know, some of my writers' friends that I've kind of pulled together, you know, in over the last few years, they're all 10. That is a stupid idea. And I'm like, I know, and it's not easy, is it? But I know, here we go. Yeah, there's other people who have done it, you know. Maggie um would now I can't remember which of her books, but she did it very effectively. Nice. Um, different, you know, it can be done. Can I do it? I have no idea, but um I want to bring in uh a little bit more magical surrealism into it. It's based in an old hotel that I used to live on on Jacksonville Beach when I was very young, and I was told that Charlie Chaplin lived, or not lived, but stayed in the rooms that I had. The old place was built in like 1925 or something. The Windsors were there, the mob was there in the 30s, and whatever. So there's just all this great, you know, vibe about the place. And so I'm kind of trying to pull that into a into a novel that also has a a novel within the novel. Now, if you never hear from me again, you didn't make it.
SPEAKER_00You did not make it. We'll go back to this interview as evidence. I'll be like, I this was his plan. I don't know what to do.
SPEAKER_02It was a face plant.
SPEAKER_00I haven't heard from the guy.
SPEAKER_02So I don't know.
SPEAKER_00Oh my goodness gracious. I love that you're willing to try that though. I mean, that's like, hey, let's let's give it a shot. I mean, that's kind of fearless. A lot of people are worried. They're like, oh, what if I fail, right? You know?
SPEAKER_02I I mean, again, I'm so I am so uninformed uh about writing. I mean, I've learned a lot since, and publishing since, and marketing to some degree since. But um I I didn't even know what genre I wrote in. I mean, I knew it wasn't mystery, it wasn't romance, it wasn't chiclet, whatever, but I'm told it's literary fiction, and that you have a lot more uh leeway or whatever to, you know, to go places with it. Like my books, uh, they start off like a very like baseball, you know, a very, very long pitch, uh, a long wind-up rather before the pitch. I mean, it's not like a mystery that goes, the body was laying on the floor with blood rushing out of its neck. You know, it's not like that. It's it's um, and as a southern kind of thing, there's a lot of effort put into developing a sense of place so then the character can, you know, be related to the place and be built, you know, to to reflect that place. Um so anyway, I'm I really am. I'm I'm just truly winging this. Um and and where I was going with that though is that I think what a mistake some people make is that they, you know, literary fiction is not a top-selling, you know, category. And in fact, it's it's the I think the smallest selling. Um, especially, you know, not talking about the classics, but you know, new stuff coming out. Um and I think a lot of people make the mistake of writing for what they think will be money or income out of that effort. And and don't get me wrong, a lot of people have been very successful at it. But I knew for me it wasn't about that. It was it was about what you were talking about, the very, you know, the therapeutic aspect of it and the self-examination and the you know getting getting to find a little peace with my own spirit inside my own skin, you know, that kind of thing. So I'm not I'm not gonna write mysteries or or romantic comedies or you know, whatever. You know, I'm just doing this. I I told somebody that um I equate what I'm doing in this in this writing as kind of like um a graffiti artist, you know, looking at a at a bridge overpass or a train car and going, I need to put something there that says something about it, it it says, I was here and this is what I felt about it. And so my my novels are graffiti. And so somebody asked me um a while back, what is the what is something about you that nobody else, you know, that no one else knows? And it's that I'm a Neanderthal. I'm a caveman. I'm I'm drawing under the cave. You know, I saw bisons.
SPEAKER_00Guy's written all these books, he thinks this is a Neanderthal. Okay, man, I got you. I gotcha.
SPEAKER_01I gotcha.
SPEAKER_00I gotcha. You know, I love that though. I mean, uh one of the things I love about the whole story is that you're not trying to be anything that you're not. You're just this is me. I'm putting myself out there. Here it is, here's the book. I mean, that's that's the kind of stuff that really really helps, you know, to to get it out there and to connect with readers.
SPEAKER_02And and when you're talking about advice for, you know, you know, one thing I would say to other writers is that you know, ego is is a really scary thing. In any of the arts, I think. And there's some wonderful artists who have had just crazy egos, you know. But I think when you're when you're starting out in life and you're like say you're trying to get your first uh novel or or whatever published, you are gonna be hit by so many offers from people who want to help you with your novel. And and and they're gonna they're gonna put all kinds of numbers in front of you. And my big concern about that is there there are so many people who they're either the younger people who are starting out or the older people who are like they've finally got a chance to sit down and do this, and they don't realize that that you know there's not a whole lot of money in it. And so if you start putting, if you're willing to put a whole lot of money into something that isn't going to uh offer a return on that investment, then are you really doing it for the right reason? I'm kind of thinking people who are willing to spend that kind of money for all these different programs that are out there, it's almost like they're the coal miners going up, you know, in into the Klondike and they're not gonna make any money. The guy selling the panning, you know, the pans and the jeans, you know, those are the guys who are gonna walk away with money. And so I cringe. I mean, now that I'm you know, I'm I am starting to get my name out there a little bit better. I am still hit with all these things, and it's very hard to separate, you know, who are the weasels. Well, it's not so hard really, because you figure most of them are, and um and and that's just it. There's a lot of weasels out there just waiting like carnies to snack the snap uh snatch the money out of your out of your hand, and so I would be very careful with that. Um, I mean, there's nothing wrong with attending. I mean, I wish that I could have attended some workshops and and things like that, but um but you know, I would I I I should have spent some money there, but on all the things related to you know pitching your book to publishers or publishers, there's a lot of hybrid publishers now. Yeah, and I know a guy spent ten thousand dollars to publish his book, and he probably hasn't made five out of it in three years. Wow, you know, yeah, wow, and it's it's just crazy. Now you'll have a book and you leave something of yourself behind, but for ten thousand dollars, you could get a pretty nice, you know, granite statue, you know, somewhere in in the you know, in the memory garden or whatever those are memorial garden.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_02You know, it's so many so many people that that come at you. And it's kind of the same with um in the music business, you know, a lot of people who are young and they you know they get together, they're playing in bars, they're starting to get out there more, and and all of a sudden they're hit with all these, hey, you know, we can we want to do an album for you, it's just gonna cost you, you know, six grand. You know what I mean? It's just you gotta be careful out in the world.
SPEAKER_00Right, right. Yeah, there's a ton of that. I mean, you're right. And I've seen it for writers uh you know all over the place, you know. So I think it's one of those don't let a skinny guy teach or a fat guy teach you how to get skinny, you know, type of thing.
SPEAKER_01That's exactly it. That's exactly it.
SPEAKER_00So if they haven't written, you know, and they haven't put a at least put a book out of their own that was successful, it's kind of like what are you telling me right now? Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And the other thing with that is that a contract is not necessarily a good thing. I mean, you really uh when I long time ago in arts administration, I used to book different bands and stuff for art festivals. And they were going to be, we were gonna pay what was called an honorarium. It was not their going fee. It was just if they had a had a date like maybe in Orlando and nothing else go until they were down in Miami, you know, if we caught them at the right time, say, hey, you know, can we book you for this event? You know, you got an opening, and but we're only gonna pay $10,000, or maybe, you know, maybe not even that. Um, and they would send us these contracts. And we would, it was, you know, like you hear about the brown MMs and all that kind of stuff, what wattage bulbs had to be around the mirrors and what foods, you know, a lot of them would send their own um menus, you know, depending on what day of the week it was. Um anyway, I would just go through those contracts and just nope, nope, nope, nope. Didn't you see honorarium? You're only getting $10,000. You'll be lucky if you have an RV back behind the stage to sit in, you know, that kind of thing. And so I mean, I guess I say that because one of the first contracts that I was offered, um, actually it was offered on the bird book, which I ultimately ended up publishing myself. Um, a regional, nice regional press, very seriously considered it. Last minute didn't take it because I think I blew the Zoom meeting and said it it doesn't bother you that I don't have an MFA, and then the whole thing fell apart. I don't know what was wrong with me. Kind of like I'm probably saying wrong things now, but anyway, um you're doing fine, man.
SPEAKER_00Really? I appreciate it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and I don't know. Anyway, um the c I was offered a contract on that book, and it was by a beginner um press. And yeah, some of these presses, they might only publish five books a year. Some of them publish 30, like the one that that just did the uh the Mustang book. But you want to be very careful what's what's in those contracts, because some of these people they start what they think is going to be a little publishing company, and they just they have big egos and they want to control everything and whatever. And you know, and and I think the problem I had with that one is it had a morality clause in it that they could they could have possession of my book if I did something, they didn't specify what, but they thought, you know, was not good, you know, was wrong. It's like what you know, you're gonna have to give me a list and it better be, you know, it better not include these things. Wow. But I mean, there's all kinds, you got to be really careful. But fortunately, there are some organizations like the Authors Guild and a few others that you know they'll give you some ideas on, you know, they'll tell you one if a publisher is known to be a scammer, um, they'll tell you you know what to look for in contracts and things like that. So self-education, yeah. I'm sure there's workshops on this, I'm sure there's conferences, but I never made it to any of them. I had to do it the hard way. Like I said, the speed of hard knocks. Just like a test dummy, you know.
SPEAKER_00No, that's I you know I appreciate it because that's great advice for a lot of authors who are out there. We have a ton of uh aspiring authors, you know, out there. So uh I feel like I'm I'm uh short circuiting you though, because I'm taking all this advice from you right now, and it's like that's supposed to be my last question, man.
SPEAKER_01So I'm sorry no, no, you're good.
SPEAKER_00I'm just afraid you're gonna be out of. I'm sure you have more left in the tank.
SPEAKER_02So I have I have plenty to say to you.
SPEAKER_00I'm not gonna worry about that. You're not done with me yet. No, man. I mean, I can sit here and talk to you forever. The uh as we start to bring this uh interview back down to a close. Um how can people uh how can they reach you? I still have another question or two for you, but how can they reach you? I want to make sure I include this and find your books.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, okay. Well, um, they can find the book. One way to find the book and contact me is through the publisher, which is unsolicited press. Um people can find me through my website, which is it's gonna be weird, but it's Tim Bryant's Armadillo Island.com. Um they can find me through there. Um I'm on Facebook and I can't remember, I think it's author Tim Bryant or Tim Bryant author. And that's on social media, that's where I am. I I went on some of the other spots, wasted a lot of time, in my opinion, on Twitter and Substack and you know whatever. Substack is great for people who have a lot of time to write. Just, you know, I don't know what they're gonna do with that. But um, if I'm gonna sit down and work on something, it needs to be something that I don't know. It's gonna have to be a book, you know. It's gonna have to be a novel or something. But um, Instagram, I didn't really get too far with it. Um, it just wasn't me. I just didn't didn't feel it. But those places are easy ways to find me. Um, you can also just Google me, Tim Bryan, in Jonesville, South Carolina. Not a big place. Um you can you can roll into the little hardware store that's right next to the coin op washing machine or washing bay or whatever, and um and say, Do you know Tim Bryant? And they're going, Yeah, he's right down there around the corner and off in that house that's like a beach house in a cow pasture.
SPEAKER_00There's only one. Over in Armadillo Island, right again.
SPEAKER_02And and the book is available online all over the place. I mean, it's it's on um Amazon, of course, it's on Barnes and Noble, Walmart has it online, just a whole bunch of places. Um, and we are working to get it into the bookstores. Now, some of the the bookstores, especially on the coast that we're kind of focused on right now because it's set down there, they're offering it like like a lot of independent bookstores are doing, where they're offering it if they don't have it on their shelves yet, they'll they'll buy it online for you through their website and then ship it to you, which is kind of I don't know. I guess that's good for you know, people who are in the store and want to ask for it and they don't have it. But I don't know if that's makes much difference to people who just want to go to Amazon and not go to you know wherever.
SPEAKER_00So you never know, man. Some people still like that that brick and mortar thing, but yeah, yeah, absolutely.
SPEAKER_02So it's it's everywhere.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, good, good, good, good, gotcha. Well, uh we'll make sure we have that stuff, especially the website. Uh will be in our show notes. So no one's gonna have to remember that necessarily. They'll be able to just click the link and go right to your website, all right, and they'll find you know Arm Armadillo Island uh there. It'll be all worked out.
SPEAKER_02Tim Bryant's Armadillo Island.
SPEAKER_00Tim Bryant's Armadillo. I checked out your website, so I saw that and I was like, what is this Armadillo Island? Yeah, what is that? All right. Um, in the interest of of time, because I'm looking at the clock now going, wow, we've been talking. Yeah. Um, so I'm gonna I'm gonna shut us down with just one more question here. And I I know you have uh I like I said, something left in the tank. You've given a ton of advice to people, and I I love I love that and been very open with your story. So thank you for sharing that with everybody. Thank you for letting me. It's uh awesome, man. The um last question I always ask, and uh that is again, we have a lot of aspiring authors who are listening to this, but you are a multiple published author. So congratulations on that, obviously. What is your best piece of advice? Uh, your best advice? I mean, like dig deep now. Best advice for somebody, right? Uh who is not quite where you are yet.
SPEAKER_02There's so much in addition to you know what I've talked about. Um, I mean, you know, write for the joy of writing, that sort of thing. Um, do get connected with other writers, don't be a hermit like I have been. That's that's a big mistake. Um don't, you know, another big mistake that people make is they feel that they have to have an agent. And I don't know. Now, maybe an agent will get you into the big five or whatever, and that's great. If you're ready for it, if your story is so phenomenal, you know, you can push through all the clutter, you know, that that the agents get, all the queries they get. Um but everybody that not that most of the people I know who have have tried to get an agent, if they didn't find it completely uh uh frustrating, then if if they did get an agent, they spent a lot of time revising their story to somebody else's interest, only to have that person later just say, Ah, I can't think who can do this, you know, like the contract runs out, or you know, people agents who quit like it's their first job in an agency and they thought they'd like it, you know, whatever. But you know, how many thumbprints do you really want on your work? And now I I can see that maybe for some of the more popular genres, you know, like mystery and thrillers and romantic comedies and stuff, because that's very formulaic. And you know, that's the an agent or even a publisher will try to make sure that you fit that those templates. Um, but writing literary fiction, I don't want anybody. That's one reason I write it. I mean, I I want to say um through my writing what I want to say. And I did have a British company. Um, they were very from a from from one of the cultural issues that that is in that book, they were very upset by it. And they wanted me to change it. And in my feeling is that, you know, going back to being a caveman and writing painting on the wall, what I see, it it was something that I see. And I don't want to, you know, I don't want to unsee, you know, I don't want to lie to people as far as what my experience or observation was. And so, you know, make sure you're going someplace where you can, to the extent that you want to or need to, um, with your work, kind of writing you do, retain, you know, your integrity in it.
SPEAKER_00I don't know. Great, great advice. I knew you had more left in the tank. All right, there you go.
SPEAKER_02Well, I might I hope I haven't run out. I I might have need to talk to somebody at a bar or something about what I do. And I'll say I just left it on the podcast. I have nothing at all.
SPEAKER_00I left it all on the field, right there. It's all over.
SPEAKER_01It's all on the field.
SPEAKER_00Oh, there it is, man. I love it. All right. Uh folks, um, author Tim Bryant, uh, the stained glass Mustang. Go check it out. Uh, Tim, thank you, man, for coming on, uh, just for being yourself, sharing your story, uh, encouraging everybody out there, and for such great advice. Uh, you've been an amazing guest, and I've loved every minute of this. Thanks for coming on the show.
SPEAKER_02I have absolutely loved it too. I really have. I'm so glad you're around us.
SPEAKER_00All right, folks. That's been another fantastic episode of the Right Path Podcast, where truth still matters, and words still have power. Folks who've said it before will say it again. This is the place for authors who know that every single page is a step forward towards finding your right path. Until next time.